Ousmane Dembélé, then FC Barcelona striker, during the preseason friendly match against Real Madrid in Dallas (Texas), July 29, 2023. SAM HODDE / AFP
Adept at dribbling, Ousmane Dembélé took the whole of FC Barcelona on the wrong foot. Again on July 12, the president of the Catalan club, Joan Laporta, announced that negotiations for the extension of the 26-year-old Frenchman were on track, with a multi-year contract at stake. But the striker finally signed up, Saturday August 12, for a five-year lease with Paris Saint-Germain, the day the season resumed for his new club (against Lorient, at 9 p.m.).
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The club of the capital concretizes a transfer which it had already envisaged in 2016, 2017 and 2019. First exchanges with the entourage of the player were then held. But it was this summer that PSG finally managed to attract Dembélé, for 50 million euros. Compared to the sometimes crazy sums circulating in professional football, this is a rather reasonable amount for a still young international striker. For PSG, it is also a risky bet, because the native of Vernon (Eure) has not yet confirmed, over time, the expectations placed on him.
The young Dembélé aroused many, from his first steps in Evreux. He grew up in the Madeleine district, like his friend Dayot Upamecano, present at his side at the last World Cup with the France team. At the time, during matches organized between CM1 and CM2, Dembélé faced Upamecano and made his feints a specialty, like his joie de vivre.
“I like the good atmosphere, that everything is going well in the team, explained Dembele at the last World Cup. In 2018, having a close-knit group, which laughs, which rooms and which is serious when necessary, is what made us win the World Cup. » The Parisian locker room will discover in the coming months a player capable of uniting thanks to his good humor.
Criticized for its lack of professionalism
His fear of cats, revealed by Randal Kolo Muani in Qatar, revealed a new side to his character and gave rise to smiles. His arrival in the professional world, on the other hand, did not make many people laugh. Stade Rennais, first of all, when the Breton club saw the young player he had been incubating since he was 13 years old refused a first professional contract, in the summer of 2015. “I thank Rennes for having made it, but this proposal comes too late”then explains Dembele to The Team.
Confident at just 18, he adds that he “won’t change my mind”. One more feint, because in October 2015, he finally signed with Rennes. Very quickly, the prodigy sickened the defenses of Ligue 1. “He revealed himself through his ability to eliminate opponents, but [il] sometimes did a little too much by wanting to dribble three or four players”remembers Rolland Courbis, his trainer at the time.
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